The Colorado river: Instability and basin management, William L. Graf, association of american...
1
468 BOOK REVIEWS original contribution in this context and should en- courage a wider application of such measurements. Finally, Part V on soil geomorphic applications in- dudes a review by Morgan (Chapter 19) of the effect of agriculture on aggregate stability, crusting and pulveriz- ation, and a soil trafficability model by Anderson (Chapter 20) which includes an elegant way for the prediction of the soil moisture curve and regime, which might well be also useful in the hillslope solute-removal model of Burt and Trudgill (Chapter I). The production of the book by Allen and Unwin is excellent, including the index, though location terms have been avoided. For some reason there is a List of Tables but not a List of Figures. I have never found these lists very useful but we should either have both or none. In all, a book which is a credit to the B.G.R.G. and its editors. Highly recommended to all geomorphologists and pedologist s . D. H. YAALON Hebrew University, Jerusalem THE COLORADO RIVER: INSTABILITY AND BASIN MANAGEMENT, William L. Graf, Association of American Geographers, 1985. ISBN 0-89291 -I 86-7. This book is the latest (14th) in the series produced by the AAG and titled ‘Resource Publications in Geography’. The series is very broad ranging from computer mapping to alcohol abuse but all the contri- butions have one of two objectives in mind: either they are a teaching tool to aid studies in geography or they try to demonstrate the role of geography in research, education or business. I see this book as being addressed to the former task. The book of about 3540,000 words is well presented and readable. The title implies a greater degree of management content than is in fact the case since the book is strongly oriented to applied geomorphology. The main chapters deal with flooding from a hydrologic viewpoint,vertical and horizontal channel movement, the influence of vegetation and of high dams and finally chemical characteristics of the river with an emphasis on anthropogenic sources. Together with the descriptive first chapter, this provides a sound basis for a case study of this important water resource but the user would have to find more information on economic and regulatory issues. As a teaching text it would have benefitted from a greater amount of tabulated material and the lack of an index limits the use of the book for quick reference. The interpretation of the term instability needs to be broad since it is used to report information on change, variation, trends and impacts. On the whole I thought this book a useful addition to the literature. With similar books on other major river and resource systems Kokopelle will no longer be playing a lone environmental tune. If you fail to follow the last sentence, read the book. ADRIAN MCDONALD University of Leeds GEOLOGY FOR CIVIL ENGINEERS, 2nd edn, A. c. McLean and C. D. Gribble (revised by C. D. Gribble), George Allen and Unwin, 1985. No. of pages: 314. The first edition of this text (1979) provided a very useful, concise and inexpensive introduction to geology for engineering undergraduates. It has found a useful niche with British students in part because of its concen- tration on case studies from the United Kingdom, and partly because of its low cost. A second edition is consequently very welcome. However, there is very little new material incorporated into the text. Rather the authors have taken the opportunity to correct some errors and omissions from the first text, re-shaded many of the diagrams, re-ordered material within chapters and slightly expanded the references at the end of each chapter. After an introductory chapter, the chapter on minerals and rocks gives slightly more weight to clays and sedimentary rocks than the original text. Soils and weathering processes are described in the next chapter together with the landforms evolving from aeolian, coastal, glacial and periglacial erosion and deposition. In the chapter on rocks, work on plate tectonics, seismicity and the relationship between faults and earthquakes is introduced. The groundwater chapter gives a clear com- prehensive treatment of physical processes and discusses applied problems such as the disposal of toxic waste underground. However, there is no mention of ground water chemistry. In Chapter 6 they consider approaches to site investigations of geological phenomenon in a very useful manner. The last two chapters look at rock properties and the use of rock as an aggregate, and then at case studies where geology has had a significant bearing on engineering construction. Minor criticisms would include the lack of scales on micrographs and photographs in the second chapter, a very limited discussion of mapping techniques for site investigation and no mention of remote sensing tech- niques which would fit well with the brief treatment of the use of air photographs in site exploration. PAULINE E. KNEALE Leeds University
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Transcript of The Colorado river: Instability and basin management, William L. Graf, association of american...
468 BOOK REVIEWS
original contribution in this context and should en- courage a wider application of such measurements.
Finally, Part V on soil geomorphic applications in- dudes a review by Morgan (Chapter 19) of the effect of agriculture on aggregate stability, crusting and pulveriz- ation, and a soil trafficability model by Anderson (Chapter 20) which includes an elegant way for the prediction of the soil moisture curve and regime, which might well be also useful in the hillslope solute-removal model of Burt and Trudgill (Chapter I).
The production of the book by Allen and Unwin is
excellent, including the index, though location terms have been avoided. For some reason there is a List of Tables but not a List of Figures. I have never found these lists very useful but we should either have both or none. In all, a book which is a credit to the B.G.R.G. and its editors. Highly recommended to all geomorphologists and pedologist s .
D. H. YAALON Hebrew University, Jerusalem
THE COLORADO RIVER: INSTABILITY AND BASIN MANAGEMENT, William L. Graf, Association of American Geographers, 1985. ISBN 0-89291 -I 86-7.
This book is the latest (14th) in the series produced by the AAG and titled ‘Resource Publications in Geography’. The series is very broad ranging from computer mapping to alcohol abuse but all the contri- butions have one of two objectives in mind: either they are a teaching tool to aid studies in geography or they try to demonstrate the role of geography in research, education or business. I see this book as being addressed to the former task.
The book of about 3540,000 words is well presented and readable. The title implies a greater degree of management content than is in fact the case since the book is strongly oriented to applied geomorphology. The main chapters deal with flooding from a hydrologic viewpoint, vertical and horizontal channel movement, the
influence of vegetation and of high dams and finally chemical characteristics of the river with an emphasis on anthropogenic sources. Together with the descriptive first chapter, this provides a sound basis for a case study of this important water resource but the user would have to find more information on economic and regulatory issues. As a teaching text it would have benefitted from a greater amount of tabulated material and the lack of an index limits the use of the book for quick reference. The interpretation of the term instability needs to be broad since it is used to report information on change, variation, trends and impacts. On the whole I thought this book a useful addition to the literature. With similar books on other major river and resource systems Kokopelle will no longer be playing a lone environmental tune. If you fail to follow the last sentence, read the book.
ADRIAN MCDONALD University of Leeds
GEOLOGY FOR CIVIL ENGINEERS, 2nd edn, A. c. McLean and C. D. Gribble (revised by C. D. Gribble), George Allen and Unwin, 1985. No. of pages: 314.
The first edition of this text (1979) provided a very useful, concise and inexpensive introduction to geology for engineering undergraduates. It has found a useful niche with British students in part because of its concen- tration on case studies from the United Kingdom, and partly because of its low cost. A second edition is consequently very welcome. However, there is very little new material incorporated into the text. Rather the authors have taken the opportunity to correct some errors and omissions from the first text, re-shaded many of the diagrams, re-ordered material within chapters and slightly expanded the references at the end of each chapter.
After an introductory chapter, the chapter on minerals and rocks gives slightly more weight to clays and sedimentary rocks than the original text. Soils and weathering processes are described in the next chapter together with the landforms evolving from aeolian,
coastal, glacial and periglacial erosion and deposition. In the chapter on rocks, work on plate tectonics, seismicity and the relationship between faults and earthquakes is introduced. The groundwater chapter gives a clear com- prehensive treatment of physical processes and discusses applied problems such as the disposal of toxic waste underground. However, there is no mention of ground water chemistry. In Chapter 6 they consider approaches to site investigations of geological phenomenon in a very useful manner. The last two chapters look at rock properties and the use of rock as an aggregate, and then at case studies where geology has had a significant bearing on engineering construction.
Minor criticisms would include the lack of scales on micrographs and photographs in the second chapter, a very limited discussion of mapping techniques for site investigation and no mention of remote sensing tech- niques which would fit well with the brief treatment of the use of air photographs in site exploration.
PAULINE E. KNEALE Leeds University
